Sprats a LA Anchovies
Ingredients
Directions
Salt and dry
Select the finest and freshest sprats and sprinkle them with salt. Let them sit for 24 hours.
Remove the sprats one by one and wipe them dry.
Season and pack
In a bowl, mix the powdered saltpeter, coarse sea salt, sal prunel, basket salt, and powdered cochineal.
Prepare flat oval containers and cover the bottoms with the seasoning mixture.
Pack the sprats closely in the containers, filling them with the seasoning mixture, and cover the tops with more seasoning.
Seal the containers with bladder.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Sprats
- The main fish; salting firms its flesh and draws out moisture.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws out moisture from the fish and seasons it, slowing spoilage.
- Saltpetre
- Acts as a curing agent that helps preserve the fish and keep its colour.
- Cochineal
- Adds a red colour to the fish, giving it an appealing appearance.
The step that matters
Wiping the sprats dry before packing. Salt draws water out of the fish and dissolves into it. Surface moisture left on the sprats dilutes the cure and can encourage spoilage, so each fish should be dried thoroughly before it is packed in the seasoning.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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